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Hediya Yousef, co-president of the Rojava-Northern Syria Federal Region, said on Tuesday that the Iraqi Kurds have a legal right to determine their own destiny.

A non-binding independence referendum for Iraqi Kurdistan will be held on 25 September 2017 after a decision by the majority of the Iraqi Kurdish parties.

“This is an internal decision related to the Iraqi constitution and a domestic issue and it’s basically considered a legal right for the Kurds within the Kurdistan region to determine their own destiny,” the Syrian Kurdish official said in an interview with the Vedeng.

Meanwhile, the Iraqi central government said on Friday that any unilateral move by the Kurdistan Region towards independence would be rejected by Baghdad. “No party can, on its own, decide the fate of Iraq, in isolation from the other parties,” said Saad al-Haddithi, Iraqi government spokesman.

Furthermore, both Turkey and Iran have opposed the independence referendum. However, the Iraqi Kurds say that the regional countries should not interfere in the Kurdistan region’s affairs.

“When we talk about a referendum, we talk about Kurdistan in Iraq only,” KRG’s foreign relations chief Falah Mustafa Bakir said, in a message to the neighbouring countries that have their own Kurdish populations, and fear Kurdish independence will inspire their own Kurds to seek more independence.

The president of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), Masoud Barzani, announced September 25 as a referendum day on Kurdish independence.